Joan Butterstein watched as the end came in steady waves of misery for her husband. "Chemo, radiation, and then more chemo and more radiation ... and he was sick and miserable frequently, if not most of that time," she said.

When the lung cancer finally took him after more than 50 years of marriage, Joan said goodbye to her husband with a promise to herself: "I was going to make sure that I don't go that way."